Medical Imaging Research Laboratory, Federal University of Health Sciences of Porto Alegre, Porto Alegre, Rio Grande Do Sul, Brazil.
Postgraduate program, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Brazil.
Lung. 2019 Jun;197(3):259-265. doi: 10.1007/s00408-019-00214-7. Epub 2019 Mar 21.
The lung acinus is the most distal portion of the airway responsible for the gas exchange. The normal acini are not visible on conventional computed tomography (CT), but the advent of micro-CT improved the understanding of the microarchitecture of healthy acini. The comprehension of the acinar architecture is pivotal for the understanding of CT findings of diseases that involve the acini. Centriacinar emphysema, for example, presents as round areas of low attenuation due to the destruction of the most central acini with compensatory enlargement of proximal acini due to alveolar wall destruction. In pulmonary fibrosis, intralobular septal fibrosis manifests as acinar wall thickening with an overlap of acinar collapse and compensatory dilation of surrounding acini constituting the cystic disease typical of the usual interstitial pneumonia pattern. This is a state-of-the-art review to describe the acinar structure from the micro-CT perspective and display how the comprehension of the acinar structure can aid in the interpretation of its microarchitecture disruption on conventional CT.
肺腺泡是气道的最远端部分，负责气体交换。常规计算机断层扫描（CT）看不到正常的腺泡，但微 CT 的出现提高了对健康腺泡微观结构的理解。理解腺泡结构对于理解涉及腺泡的疾病的 CT 表现至关重要。例如，中心性气肿表现为由于最中心的腺泡破坏导致的低衰减圆形区域，由于肺泡壁破坏，近端腺泡代偿性扩大。在肺纤维化中，小叶间隔纤维化表现为腺泡壁增厚，伴有腺泡塌陷和周围腺泡代偿性扩张的重叠，构成常见间质性肺炎模式的囊性疾病。这是一篇从微 CT 角度描述腺泡结构的最新综述，并展示了对腺泡结构的理解如何有助于解释常规 CT 上腺泡微观结构的破坏。
